


Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft

by Claus_Lucas



Category: Mother 1 | EarthBound Zero | EarthBound Beginnings
Genre: Adventure, Character Study, Comedy, F/M, Friendship, Neurodiversity, Vignette, just the all around fun and bonding that the m1 kids deserve, there's a bit of ana/ninten but it's mentioned in passing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-09-03 12:59:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8714869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claus_Lucas/pseuds/Claus_Lucas
Summary: Here’s a boy that’s wrestled bears and waltzed through poltergeist-infested buildings. He ain’t afraid of no alien invasion.He also says things like "swanky" and "the bee's knees" because he adopted all of his parents' old-school slang.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jattendrai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jattendrai/gifts).



> for my pal winifred who i adopted a bunch of headcanons from. [check out these good kids](http://abimee.tumblr.com/post/117746402121/my-wrist-hurts-but-huzzah-i-drew-something)
> 
> [calling occupants of interplanetary craft](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9URM_5R-vWk)
> 
> ninten has autism + adhd + schizophrenia

School for Ninten has become sitting in the principal’s office for seven hours straight and he positively hates it. He isn’t being punished – rather this is the teacher’s attempt to accommodate the particularities of Ninten’s personality, without sacrificing the academic efforts of either him or his former classmates. They haven’t been going about it in quite the right way, however, barely reaching beyond their little orthodox box to realize what he’s actually in need of. The school body insists on its tradition of assigning heaps of worksheets and evaluating his progress with written exams. It’s been five months since this arrangement started and the improvement of his grades is minimal.

As much as he begrudges it, though, Ninten has to admit that this _is_ better than before. For starters, the principal is tolerant of most of his hyperactive tendencies: she allows him to rock his body, kick his legs against the desk, and fidget with writing utensils for hours. The one quirk she’ll frown at is flapping, so Ninten has learned to shake his hands behind his back, or underneath the desk, anywhere that she can’t accidentally glance at. Pacing in circles is also out of the question, but he’s entitled to a few excursions into the hallway throughout each day, if only with the excuse that he needs to use the bathroom. He eats lunch right here, from the paper bag his mother has prepared.

All in all, it beats being unable to move. He can’t vent the energy clogging his system enough to focus on most of his work but at least he isn’t resorting to tearing the skin from his knuckles. There’s also the bonus of not having to deal with the squabbles of other children – and their thoughts on top of that. Ninten can’t disturb anyone when he’s isolated and there’s no teacher for him to interrupt with his spontaneous and often off topic inquiries. So everything that he has the urge to blurt out gets channeled into the paper in front of him, scribbled into the margins and where the answers to equations should go. Ninten really doesn’t understand the point of repeating the same thing over, and over, and over again. It’s not like he’s struggling to understand his classes – his test results are favorable, impressive for his age even. What holds him back, according to this school, is the homework he won’t turn in. Everything he’s worked on while in the principal’s office is the same: once he’s memorized the formulas, his motivation to continue drains. If anyone asks him, he can give a satisfying response, so why waste time writing it down?

At the end of a school day, no one can force him to stick around, regardless of how much work he hasn’t finished. He doesn’t wait to be excused, either. His eyes have been half on his tapping fingers and half on the clock nailed to the wall, tracing its slow trajectory for hours. Leaping from the chair, he shoves the assortment of papers, notebooks, and miscellaneous tools into his backpack, slinging it over his right shoulder without bothering to zip it closed. He reels towards the door, his unoccupied hand tucking his box braids behind his ears so he can have a clear view of the door.

The principal had left to attend to a meeting outside but now she’s on her way back to tell him that he can go home. She never gets a chance to speak, however, because the moment she pushes the door wide open Ninten is making a dash for it, sliding under her arm and nearly falling on his face when he trips on his untied shoelace. He waves the principal goodbye, not stopping for a second.

* * *

There are some kids in Ninten’s school that have signaled him out because of his sensitivity. They’ve locked him in bathroom stalls and ambushed him during his long treks home through the woods, but for a while now he’s been able to get away from even the packs by performing a little trick with his fingers. He doesn’t know when or where he learned it – he’s just sort of always recalled being able to do it. Middle school science courses haven’t explained how it works but he’s started doing some research on the side to try to figure it out. So far he hasn’t opened up about it with any adult because of some lingering distrust (a history of carrying “paranoid,” “confused,” and “delusional” as labels has made him shy away from assertiveness). Ninten only friends are his family, so there isn’t really anyone to confide in.

Even then, he does not hesitate to use it – he merely has to touch his index and middle fingers to his forehead, and it happens: there’s a glaring beam of light, partly translucent, like gazing through a stained-glass window. It feels kind of warm inside his chest as well, swelling up his throat until his face blushes. The cadence of his heart echoes in his head, reminding him of embarking on a new adventure. If fear paralyzed him for a moment, this adrenaline rush always kicks him back into motion. He hightails out of there, snickering all the while because wasn’t that cool? Did anyone else see the look on their faces? People are so easy to surprise.

There have been occasions when Ninten has met with trouble but he makes an honest effort to aim the light away from people – when it hits someone directly, the result is hardly pleasant. None of the kids that he’s accidentally attacked have gone far with their accusations, however: when all is said and done, there’s always a severe lack of incriminating evidence. The facts are usually the same: Ninten’s significantly smaller or weaker than his bullies, he doesn’t have a record of causing trouble, and, whatever they meant by “a beam of light attacked me,” it sounds like a poorly constructed fib to her. Even the parents won’t insist she reconsider her verdict. Ninten feels guilty for allowing the truth to go overlooked but the damage to them is superficial and those kids _have_ tried to fit him into a locker before.

There are other oddities that Ninten’s capable of realizing: suspending objects in the air, understanding the feelings of animals, describing things he can’t see with extraordinary detail, sensing a storm before its clouds have started to gather. They used to be quite overwhelming, and still can be occasionally. Being in a crowd meant receiving a symphony of distorted speech, tangled in his head like a radio tuned in to several signals at once. When he felt in danger, dread would be poignant, the chill of a whirlwind that hadn’t yet formed seeping into his bones, the roar of thunder scratching his eardrums. Exposure has forced him to try to mediate. Often during his first year of middle school, he pulled out his hearing aids in hope of blocking out his classmates’ thoughts. He has to speak loudly during such episodes, intonate each syllable slowly and carefully so he won’t lose his train of thoughts amidst the rest of what he’s hearing. Abruptly, he may switch from the subject of a conversation to something unrelated, something he picked up from the outside. This leads to a lot of confusion, for both others and himself.

Sometimes, when he experiences a particularly acute emotion, it can be transmitted to those in his vicinity. People won’t say it to his face, but they withdraw from the inexplicable arrival of sorrow and fear that’s produced by his presence. Ninten has accepted that he won’t be making friends with the neighborhood kids anytime soon.

There was even a time when he couldn’t control the beams of light. Each instance of success is a triumph now, a boost of confidence for him to continue honing those peculiar skills. Ninten adapts quickly to what he conquers, be it levitating a plate or riding a bicycle, so now he isn’t reluctant to try it out, but there are testimonies to his struggle scattered in plain sight. When he couldn’t sleep at night because of the energy buzzing in his body, Ninten would cup his hands together while hiding under his sheets, marveling as that anxiety was concentrated into electrical sparks. He can tone down the intensity of the beams now so they won’t hurt anyone, but back then they ran wild. Ninten had to conjure excuses for the welts across his palms, the splotches on his face – whole constellations of swelling skin with the texture of rugged earth. There haven’t been any burn scars lately. He’s getting better.

Of course, there is some convergence between this and his psychosis. They’re comfortable partners, which is to say disastrous. Volatile emotions lead to mishaps. A glass that rolls off of the table while his mother isn’t looking can’t be explained except by lying. He cracked the screen of a television once – the volume on it was too high, it was making him panic. He writes down events so he won’t forget them, trying to be as detailed as possible. What he saw, felt, heard, and all around experienced is encrypted into one of his numerous journals. He looks for the signs that something isn’t quite complete, possibly a misperception, potentially a hallucination. There’s no one to validate his alleged psychic powers except when others take notice of their effects: his sister pointing out the broken doll, the doctor asking about the burn scars on his arms, a bully accusing him of being attacked with light. There’s proof. Ninten might not know exactly what’s going on, but something certainly _is_.

* * *

Falling headfirst into the bedroom carpet interrupts Ninten’s dreams. He doesn’t usually roll in his sleep but this time he seems to have slipped right off of the mattress. A blanket remains swaddled around his body so he wriggles his limbs to free himself. He tries to stand but a violent shove shatters his balance. Squinting in the darkness to discern what just happened, Ninten discovers that there is no aggressor, merely an instability in the foundation of either the Earth or reality. Well, the version of reality that his brain broadcasts.

An earthquake in this corner of the globe is highly unlikely so it has to be the latter. Alarm dissolves into recognition, a thread of terror still intact but it’s the kind that precedes the mundane and inevitable, like going to a crowded place or being injected with a vaccine. He’s supposed to tell his mother when he’s worried he might be undergoing a psychotic episode but he’s tired and she’s probably asleep anyway, he doesn’t want to disturb her. This isn’t especially frightening so he should be fine. The tremors had a certain rhythm to them, too – Ninten started visualizing it as a song, hoping that’d lull him back to sleep.

He might’ve lain there all night if an animated lamp hadn’t attacked him. He watches it detach from his desk, dismissing the concept of gravity entirely as it waltzes through the air with its bulb flickering on and off, despite its cord no longer being connected to an electrical current. It’s a tad peculiar but not threatening. Until, after he’s finally shut his eyes, the lamp takes a sharp turn and rams into his leg. Ninten winces, flipping sideways and drawing his knees into his stomach. Hallucinations aren’t supposed to be tangible. The bruise emerging from his thigh says otherwise.

Or this isn’t a psychotic episode at all.

* * *

It’s hard to decide what to wear when it’s undefined how long it’ll be until he can come back home. Ninten pulls a striped crop top over his shirt, ties a winter jacket to the right strap of his backpack, and grabs his favorite hat, the cranberry baseball cap from 1967 (the logo is faded but it once belonged to his father’s former team). Ninten’s pants are retractable, the kind with zippers on each side so everything from his knees down can be separated.

His mother has just finished rubbing sun lotion into his skin and he’s already off, angling towards the door despite the twins clinging to his arms. Ninten’s sisters are trying to list every little thing that he might forget to do while on his own, a masked attempt at prolonging his departure. They release him as he approaches the exit, stepping back to stand on opposite sides of their mother with matching bittersweet smiles. Ninten looks at his family and musters a grin, wide and lopsided – it practically shouts, “I don’t think I’ve ever felt so excited in my life before!”

The telephone rings. Mother gestures for him to answer. Ninten goes over the rules of phone calls in his head and then picks up the receiver. He spins the ring around his finger while father speaks. The attempts to ground himself prove futile, however, because he’s already lost in some distant wilderness, committing to memory none of what he’s hearing. Hopefully Ninten’s father isn’t saying anything as important as when he first called.

The call concludes with Ninten’s only input: “All right, sounds swanky.”

The cover of grandfather’s diary is soaked in sweat by the time Ninten steps out to face the rising sun.

* * *

There is really nothing remarkable about poltergeists and aliens as far as Ninten’s concerned. He’s read the _Space Odyssey_ novels. He’s watched _Hausu_. His favorite pastime is inserting himself into science fiction epics that he weaves while walking in the woods.

Possessed furniture? Save the world from an extraterrestrial invasion? There are zombies in the graveyard? Psychic powers are real?

Compared to some of the tricks psychosis pulls, there’s nothing to fear from a couple of rampaging machines and animals. Wrestling a bear is no problem. He’ll convert that robot to scrap metal. He’s right at the age when children earnestly believe that they can do anything. Neither delusions nor bleeding knees can stop him.

* * *

The roof isn’t great for lying on but Ninten’ll take what he can get while he listens to Lloyd plead his case. Here’s a boy that’s perfectly comfortable using a trashcan as shelter and Ninten is honestly immensely interested in him.

With his backpack supporting his head, Ninten lifts his gaze to place Lloyd in center stage. Lloyd has arms wrapped around the trashcan rim, the lid still perched on his head and reflecting all sorts of colors thanks to the sunlight. Lloyd won’t meet Ninten’s eyes but that’s fine, no pressure. Ninten’ll probably look away if he tries, actually.

When misfits recognize each other, it’s always a tremendous pleasure. Once the awkward introductions and attempts at striking a coherent conversation are over, there’s a sense of understanding and appreciation that makes a bond thicken like milk turning to butter, regardless of the bumps that inevitably litter that initial stage. Ninten doesn’t know who Lloyd is but he knows that he _likes_ him, and the anticipation of the former is akin to unwrapping a present on his birthday.

Before Lloyd can trust him with much, however, he has a request, and it’d be too challenging for him to explain why he wants that particular item but it serves several functions. Lloyd is physically weak, he painstakingly knows, and there’s simply no way he could venture into one of the nearby factories to procure a bottle rocket. But this stranger seems strong – he’s got those cool, magical powers (Ninten is good enough at PSI now to summon Beam with a snap of his fingers, a sight that certainly impresses Lloyd). The other reason is insurance: does Ninten care enough to do a little searching and possibly fighting? Finally there’s the fact that, despite having a lot to unbox, Lloyd frequently lacks the means to express himself to others (he can’t even communicate with two people at once, and a single person takes all of his concentration). A bottle rocket can change that: it gives Lloyd a topic to discuss, a starting point in his story, and, hopefully, a common interest. Then, of course, if things go that far, Lloyd can demonstrate how skilled he is by sending the rocket flying into the sky (he can even direct its trajectory!).

“You want me to steal an explosive?” Ninten asks.

Lloyd nods his head.

There’s a pause – eyebrows furrowing, head tilting, amusement carving a smile out of Ninten’s surprised expression. He starts to laugh. But it’s not the mean-spirited sort.

“Sure, sure,” Ninten says between chortles, already sitting up and picking his backpack off the ground, “I’ll steal your explosive, you just wait here.”

* * *

Duncan’s Factory is one giant establishment, organized more as a labyrinth than any coherent building. The adventure seems to fly by, however, because any time that they aren’t engaged in combat Ninten or Lloyd is rambling on about something they like, or an experience they’ve had, or just an interesting fact that comes to mind and they feel like sharing. Lloyd explains the whole mechanics of bottle rockets, throwing in a few other similar explosives. Ninten narrates a science experiment that he conducted in elementary school, then listens patiently as Lloyd dissects why it went wrong and how to correct it in future instances. Lloyd gets to see more of Ninten’s flashy PSI while Ninten admires the speed and efficiency with which Lloyd manages machines.. All in all, it turns out to be an excellent trip.

Lloyd’s past also begins to unravel, anecdotes of his experiences at home and in school spilling out like bullet points on an emergency flyer. Lloyd does not currently live with his father – he doesn’t disclose why. He attends school every day because he’s a diligent student, but often terror seizes him right when he’s attempting to enter his classroom, resulting in him fleeing to the roof. Lloyd’s bullies aren’t especially vile but, unlike Ninten, he has nothing to defend himself or distract them with. The whole trashcan thing started because he was dumped in it. Later Lloyd came back to it on his own accord. He has no friends and lacks the intuition to know how to make them. He seems unable to perceive the “common sense” of everyone else.

“I hate being humiliated,” Lloyd tells Ninten, “it’s the worst feeling. I’m so scared of it that I’d rather do nothing than risk being humiliated. That’s why I just hide. If they find me in the trashcan they can’t make fun of me. Not really. I chose to be there. No one dragged me.”

“The last time I went to class,” Lloyd says on another occasion, “I was overcome by the sense that I’d walked into the wrong room. I was convinced that the perfectly normal room I saw was not real. The students and teacher were not the ones I saw. In reality, they were demanding why I had entered a room that I didn’t belong to, while laughing, most of them were laughing. I knew it was just some strange paranoia, but also… I couldn’t let go of it entirely. I spent the whole day waiting. Waiting to discover I was right.”

After that outburst of words, the most Lloyd has said at once since they met, he retreats into silence. Ninten doesn’t disturb him. They’ve traveled pretty far and must be near their objective. They march on for a while longer.

When he thinks enough time has passed, Ninten asks, “Is it all right if I pat you on the shoulder?”

Lloyd nods without lifting his head. Ninten lifts one hand and touches Lloyd’s shoulder, gently, just to convey the sentiment.

The factory hums all around them.

* * *

Ninten can’t wait to ride a train. He’s seen them in films and picture books but never encountered a real one. Knowing that he’s going to board one to travel to their next destination, then ride it a few more times to reach other places, has really nurtured an excitement in him. He’s especially hyperactive today.

It shows: as soon as he’s up, he’s pushing Lloyd out of bed so they can both get ready to leave. Lloyd is groggy but Ninten hasn’t let go of his hand since he took a hold of it. Thus Ninten leads Lloyd through town, scampering so fast that he’s bound to trip on his untied shoelaces before long. Lloyd looks back at the buildings that he’s grown familiar with over the course of the last few years, bidding them farewell as both boys enter the territory of vast, empty fields.

Ninten locates the train tracks and they begin running along them. Ninten flaps his unoccupied arm against the wind. He closes his eyes, sucking in a deep, grass-scented breath. His laughter can’t help being in crescendo.

Then Ninten coughs, quiet but it makes him stumble. His foot makes a bad connection with the ground, bending his leg and nearly sending him toppling over. He manages to maintain his composure, but he coughs again, and this time he’s stopping. Lloyd glances at his friend, surprised by the sudden halt. Ninten has let go of his hand and clasped both over his mouth. The terrified stillness of an animal about to be hit by a car’s headlights has settled into Ninten’s bones.

The truth isn’t that far off.

The train hasn’t traveled this route in a while so more and more people have to depend on different types of transportation. Walking is a pretty big inconvenient, not to mention dangerous with how aggressive wild animals have been lately. There’s a road, so most people just travel by car.

Ninten searches with his gaze but he can’t pinpoint the source of the smoke. It’s gathering in the air, for now silver but it’ll darken like molasses as it expands. Ninten tells himself not to breathe but panic floods his senses. His heartbeat accelerates, the influx of oxygen and other airborne chemicals actually increases, and a familiar pain stabs his chest, straight through and then out, so it can bleed. The aching propagates like wildfire.

Lloyd knows something’s wrong. This unknown crisis lodges a mess in his throat that won’t let him speak. Fortunately he doesn’t shut off entirely. With what strength he has he steps forward to see if he can figure out what’s going on.

A coughing fit shakes Ninten. He’s let go of his face to try to locate his inhaler. He manages to pull his backpack off, though it drops on the floor and he can’t stoop down to rummage through it because of the pain in his abdomen. While tears push through the corners of Ninten’s eyes, his breathing starts dipping into hyperventilating.

Ninten’s wheezing finally strikes a chord in Lloyd’s memory. He kneels on the ground, flipping over Ninten’s backpack so all its contents tumble out. There’s a lot to take in but Lloyd recognizes what he’s looking for pretty fast. He snatches up the inhaler and stands.

By then, however, a different cloud has formed over Ninten’s head. It’s the size of a truck and looks like one, too. Except it has that distinct surrealist streak that characterizes most of his hallucinations: ordinary but slightly off, manipulated by a dose of magical realism. Those vaguely humanoid facial features are really making him feel sick.

It’s hostile, the metaphysical manifestation of his terror. As if he’s succumbed to a spell of sleep paralysis, Ninten knows by intuition that what appears before him is dangerous. Lloyd hands him the inhaler and Ninten takes a deep breath out of it, but that won’t be enough. His mind and body are never in sync, and his mind is merciless when it finds something to torment with.

It’s really a reminder of how close he always is to death. There are things that can kill anyone and things that kill specific people. He’s one of those people whose lungs can have a fatal reaction to a myriad of aerial particles. Most often, though, it’s burning petroleum. This is not an unfamiliar monster.

Curious, how they amalgamate, one disease with the other. Both have the individual power to kill him. Cooperating just feels like foul play, like two against one, a grown bully ganging up on a child. Ninten has seen some strange things on his journey but somehow his mind always has to one up everything.

Lloyd waits until Ninten’s breathing steadies. His phobia of initiating physical contact speaks volumes but he makes an effort to grab Ninten’s hand, pulling him away from where the smoke has concentrated. Lloyd doesn’t need to perceive what’s petrified his friend to understand that the best course of action is taking Ninten out of this environment.

Ninten supplies no resistance. As Lloyd carries him forward, they pass by it. Ninten feels the pressure of its presence, backed into a corner and ready to be lunged upon. Ninten gasps, drawing fresh smoke into his lungs. He hacks. A screech blares, like tiers skidding against pavement that they’ve already lost control of. Ninten, the boy that’s tamed tigers and turned zombies to dust, the hero entrusted with vanquishing a cosmic threat before it eradicates life on Earth, is going to die because of a little vehicle exhaust.

For a moment, his entire body feels like it’s been fractured and what existed before was an illusionary sense of wholeness, but he doesn’t quite descend into dissociation. Instead he breaks through the water’s surface and starts to breathe – deep, clean, it pushes the pain back.

Lloyd stops, panting with exhaustion. A shadow falls over them, enticing Ninten to look up. A colossal creature is racing through the field, dark and with a metallic gleam, but it bears no ill-will. It screeches as smoke the color of tar floods the atmosphere.

Ninten shuts his mouth and pinches his nose, but his eyes follow until it vanishes.

“The train,” he murmurs.

* * *

Ana’s family moved to Snowman when she was an infant so this has always been home to her. Despite how long it’s been, though, they haven’t exactly assimilated into the native population, perhaps in part because they took up residence in a rather secluded part of the town. It’s uncertain what purpose the chateau served before they adopted it, as it had been long abandoned by the time they arrived. Ana’s parents immediately took to it, adding their minor possessions to the furniture that was already present. Though over ten years have transpired since they settled here, the building still remains largely unfurnished, filled mainly with the essentials for everyday life. Somehow it still manages to double as their little makeshift synagogue.

Ana is always on the lookout for things that she can use to decorate. Today she’s hanging up a quilt that she knit the Star of David into. She’s really intent on adding color to these bland, beige walls. The world outside is white yearlong and staring at it for too long makes her sad, the crushing sadness of solitude.

A knock echoes through the edifice. Ana pins the quilt to the wall and turns towards the door, a curious expression appearing on her face. Not a lot of people will trek through Snowman’s perpetual winter to reach this chateau. Ana glances at her father. He gestures for her to answer.

Ana approaches the door and asks, “Who is it?” but receives no response – can’t be her mother then.

Ana opens the door a little, peering through. Two boys are standing together, freckles of snow scattered across their skin and clothes. They’re both wearing winter jackets and the taller one is carrying a brown backpack. He’s also smiling.

Before Ana can inquire for their business, the smiling boy makes it known in a loud, enthusiastic voice:

“Is this where Ana lives? We were told we’d find her in a chateau. This is like the only chateau in the area,” he says.

She should be cautious of strangers but no one’s ever come asking for _her_ so she really can’t help feeling a little excited. Even though Ana has been attending school for a couple of years, she’s yet to befriend a single kid. This is likely because the population of Snowman has remained small and tight for a long time: everyone knows everyone, and most people get along with each other. Though Ana’s family has made an effort to get to know the people of Snowman, receiving a modest amount of warmth in response, the youngsters are still reluctant to see Ana as anything but an outsider. They’re curious about her but either too scared or not interested enough to approach. Ana’s an anxious child and hasn’t done that good of a job trying to breach the gap.

“This is her,” Ana blurts out.

Ninten’s grin broadens. He extracts a pink hat from his pocket. Ana gasps.

“This is yours?” he asks.

“Yes, that’s my hat. Thank you,” answers Ana, opening the door wider so she can invite them inside.

“Won’t you step out of the cold?” she asks.

Ninten and Lloyd do as suggested. The heat of the building starts to melt the snowflakes from their bodies.

Ninten hands the hat to Ana, who immediately fits it on her head. She’s smiling, too, now.

Ana folds her arms across her chest, a gesture she’s accustom to doing for comfort. Ninten’s surprised to see a girl with spots on her skin like him, though hers are smooth, the same texture everywhere (her condition is called vitiligo). Her dress is embroidered with words in a foreign alphabet but he recognizes it from a lecture in school: Hebrew.

A funny feeling that’s been emerging from the back of Ana’s mind suddenly takes shape, making her realize that this boy standing before her is, despite being a stranger, tremendously familiar.

It’s like déjà vu. She can’t quite identify the source, but she has some inkling that she decides to pursue.

“Who are you?” asks Ana.

“My name’s Ninten,” he answers, then gestures at Lloyd: “And this is my friend Lloyd.”

Ana’s smile becomes mischievous. Now she’s pretty certain that she knows who they are, but she won’t believe it one hundred percent until she has indisputable proof.

“I had a dream not too long ago,” Ana says, “about a boy with psychic powers that’s on a mission to save the world, and how I’m supposed to help him once we meet.”

Ninten’s looks about as surprised as she is. Clearly he isn’t having prophetic dreams as well.

“I need you to show me something that’ll convince me you’re him, though,” says Ana, “the only condition is it can’t be your psychic powers. I have those, too. Anyone could have those.”

That’s not a true statement but she has to argue her case somehow. She’s certain that the boy from her dream can come up with something else.

Ninten has to meditate on her request for a spell. He places his thumb on his chin, frowning while his mind burrows through information. He considers his journey thus far and what he’s done that feels specific to him – what other people couldn’t have accidentally stumbled upon.

Then he thinks of something. It’s a little embarrassing, but, well, he’s been told he’s not half bad at it. At least his choir class was always pushing him to perform the solos.

A deep breath, and Ninten recites with his voice the melodies he’s found thus far. It’s more of a hum since there are no lyrics that he knows of but hopefully she can recognize it.

Ana actually doesn’t (she’s never heard any of the melodies before), but she’s charmed by his singing, enough for her to trust him. Having been tutored by her mother to sing in the same way, she can tell that he’s a fellow choir child. It makes her want to sing a duet. Maybe if he teaches her how this one goes.

When Ninten finishes, he looks at her expectantly, but also slightly worried. Ana flashes an approving smile to ease his nerves. Lloyd gives his friend two thumbs up.

Embarrassed, Ninten scratches the back of his head, then fiddles with the bill of his cap.

“Of course it’s really you. I didn’t actually doubt you. That was lovely, thank you,” Ana says.

“Let’s save the world together.”

* * *

It’s curious how embarking on a mission to save the world from aliens has brought three lonely kids together. None of them knew friendship in earnest before. Ana included making a single friend in her daily prayers. Lloyd had kind of lost hope, at least in Twinkle Elementary. Ninten made an effort to not think about it, concentrating all his affection and need for companionship on his family. Now they’ve each found not one but _two_ best friends, and they couldn’t be happier, they’ve never been happier.

Being young and trusting, they unfurl like flowers, sharing information with glee because it’s finally no longer a bunch of secrets. When Ana joins them, she proposes a game where, every night, each asks the other two a question and they must answer with the truth (when it’s Lloyd’s turn, Ninten will usually relay the answers back to Ana). Thus far it’s proven successful, setting the stage for loads of fun and getting familiar with one another.

Another thing they’ve started doing is mirroring each other’s habits. Ninten folds his arms over his chest a lot more often since he met Ana. Lloyd’s learned a bit of sign language from watching Ninten and Ana communicate in it. And both Lloyd and Ana are adopting several of the phrases that Ninten is so fond of using.

Ninten gives off the impression of being pretty old-school. This isn’t a conscious decision but the result of spending most of his time in the company of his parents. All the slang from the decades of their youth that still lingers in their speech, Ninten has grown up hearing it. They’re kind words, associated with warmth and unity, so when he uses them it’s always with sincere sentiment. Ana, being unfamiliar with the meaning of them, is constantly inquiring. She’s rather charmed once he explains, though, leading to her easily integrating them into her own vocabulary.

There’s another reason why Ninten is prone to repeating the same group of phrases: though he’s perfectly verbal, he can struggle to allocate the right words to convey what he’s thinking of. When he started to speak, Ninten’s mother taught him to assign multiple meanings to single words so that he could easily express himself. Thus he’s constantly referring to Ana and Lloyd as “the bee’s knees,” answers to most jokes with “you slay me,” and his most frequently used adjective is “cool.” To be clear: when he tries to tell Ana that he has a crush on her, he starts by saying that he’s “awfully keen” on her, then, when she doesn’t understand, he clarifies that he’s “stuck on her,” which she doesn’t understand either but by then Ninten’s too embarrassed to explain. He’s just a little bit “goofy” (that’s slang for being in love).

Ninten’s also opened up about his psychosis. He hasn’t named it but he’s explained most of what it entrails. There have been a few other instances like the truck and he’s rather be upfront about it so his behavior doesn’t confuse his friends. Lloyd came up with a good plan to help Ninten know if he’s hallucinating without explicitly asking: when he’s suspicious, Ninten makes a comment about it that includes specific details. For example, the ghosts in the Rosemary Manor: they’d been told that it was haunted but Ninten still needed some sort of verification that his psychosis wasn’t just projecting what he’d heard. So when he said, “I didn’t know ghosts could be pink,” Ana exclaimed, “Ah! You’re right, that _is_ a ghost!” It works out pretty well.

* * *

Of course, there are moments of profound doubt. The nature of their mission has always been abstract. They know the beginning and the end but the entire middle ground is up to interpretation. They’ve been traveling from location to location, gathering information and fending off enemies, but often their wandering feels aimless, devoid of a concrete structure. There is no clear course of action, or a map with markings on the places they need to visit. Despite having promised Queen Mary that they’d find her lost melodies, Ninten wonder if it can be accomplished at all. He’s been collecting _something_ for sure, but is it really the right notes? What evidence is there that they’re related? None really. A music box lodged in the stomach of his sister’s doll can’t be linked to a sad, singing cactus in a faraway desert. The sounds seem to fit together, and Ninten senses a strong emotional aura every time he hears a new segment, but that’s it. The only reliable melodies are the ones gathered from the slumbering dragon in Magicant and George’s mementos.

And yet here he is, regardless of whatever turmoil he harbored, to discover whether or not he’s been chasing the right trail. It’s because of his friends that he managed it, because the fate of the world and his role in it has never meant anything in the face of all the fun he’s been having. He could be wrong and he might not even be that upset. It’d just mean that he has to go back out there, start his search from scratch. Lloyd and Ana would still be with him.

So he sings. All of them do. Together, in sync, like they’ve been practicing. It’s their first performance in front of Queen Mary. They want it to be good. They hope she enjoys the lyrics they wrote for it.

Queen Marry listens. Her head is rested in her palm, but gradually it inches lower. She ends up leaning against the side of her throne, arms crossed underneath her chin. She looks like she’s descending into a warm, peaceful sleep.

When Magicant vanishes, all that remains in its wake is a wasteland. Magicant was a mirage projected from Maria’s mind. But hallucinations aren’t supposed to be tangible.

Or it wasn’t a mirage at all.


End file.
